Quantum computing solutions for optimisation problems in Energy Grids

如今，大多数人和企业的日常活动都依赖于定期可靠的能源供应，这使得能源网络成为国家的关键基础设施。建设和维护电网连接是一项耗资巨大的工作：建设一个电网每公里可能要花费150万英镑——这些成本最终要么由纳税人承担，要么由能源消费者承担。因此，能够确定网络基础设施的最佳参数可以节省大量成本，并有可能提高网络对极端天气事件等脆弱性的恢复能力。向净零的转变也影响了对电网的要求。以前电网只需要集中在少数具有相似性能特征的发电机上，现在需要连接数以百万计的小型可再生发电机，这些发电机的能量输出是高度可变的，往往是不可预测的。系统复杂性的增加转化为传统上用于优化网格的算法运行时间的指数增长，使它们有效地不再适合目的。然而，长期以来一直有人认为，量子计算有可能比经典计算机更有效地回答这类优化问题。直到最近，这才被认为是长期可行的（需要全尺寸的量子硬件），但Phasecraft最近的创新已经改变了这种观点，表明即使在短期内（当量子计算机被期望是小规模和嘈杂的），量子算法也有超越经典算法的潜力。在该项目的第一阶段的基础上，我们将继续与SuperGen能源网络中心、能源安全部和净零合作，开发一个量子软件解决方案来解决这个问题，最初解决原理证明实例。这将最终促进未来的电网规划并加速可再生能源的部署（这两个目标都是2023年早些时候发布的“为英国供电”战略中的关键目标）。

Nowadays, most people and businesses rely on a regular and reliable supply of energy for their day-to-day activities, making the energy grid a critical infrastructure for the country. Building and maintaining grid connections is a costly exercise: building an electric grid can cost up to £1.5m per km of line - costs that are ultimately borne by either the taxpayer or the energy consumer. Being able to determine the optimal parameters for the network's infrastructure can therefore lead to significant cost savings, as well as potentially improving the network's resilience against vulnerabilities such as extreme weather events.The move towards Net Zero is also affecting the requirements on the power grid. Where once the network only needed to focus on a small number of generators with similar performance characteristics, it is now required to connect millions of smaller renewable generators, whose energy output is highly variable and often unpredictable.The increased complexity of the system translates into an exponential increase in the running time of the algorithms that have been traditionally used to optimise the grid, making them effectively no longer fit for purpose.It has long been suggested, though, that quantum computing has the potential to answer these sort of optimisation questions more efficiently than classical computers. Until recently, this was only believed possible in the longer term (requiring full-scale quantum hardware) but recent innovations by Phasecraft have changed this perspective, showing that even in the near term (when quantum computers are expected to be small-scale and noisy) there is the potential for quantum algorithms to outperform classical ones.Building on the first Phase of this project, we will continue to work with the SuperGen Energy Networks Hub and the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero to develop a quantum software solution to this problem, initially addressing proof-of-principle instances. This will ultimately facilitate future network planning and accelerate the deployment of renewables (both key goals within the _Powering Up Britain_ strategy published earlier in 2023).